Amusingly characteristic of Trollope is his treatment of his villains. His
attitude toward them betrays no personal uncharitableness or animosity,
but the villain has a bad time of it just the same. Trollope places upon
him a large, benevolent, but unyielding forefinger, and says to us:
"Remark, if you please, how this inferior reptile squirms when pressure is
applied to him. I will now augment the pressure. You observe that the
squirmings increase in energy and complexity. Now, if you please, I will
bear down yet a little harder. Do not be alarmed, madam; the reptile
undoubtedly suffers, but the spectacle may do us some good, and you may
trust me not to let him do you any harm. There!--Yes, evisceration by
means of pressure is beyond question painful; but every one must have
observed the benevolence of my forefinger during the operation; and I
fancy even the subject of the experiment (were he in a condition to
express his sentiments) would have admitted as much. Thank you, ladies and
gentlemen. I shall have the pleasure of meeting you again very shortly.
John, another reptile, please!" Upon the whole, it is much to Trollope's
credit that he wrote somewhere about fifty long novels; and to the credit
of the English people that they paid him three hundred and fifty thousand
dollars for these novels--and read them!

But his success as a man of letters was still many years in the future.
After seven years in the London office, he went to Ireland as assistant
surveyor, and thenceforward he began to enjoy his business, and to get on
in it. He was paid sixpence a mile, and he would ride forty miles a day.
He rode to hounds, incidentally, whenever he got a chance, and he kept up
the practice, with enthusiasm, to within a few years of his death. "It
will, I think, be accorded to me," he says, "that I have ridden hard. I
know very little about hunting; I am blind, very heavy, and I am now old;
but I ride with a boy's energy, hating the roads, and despising young men